Your Right to Know

With the number of drug-addicted newborns soaring, Gov. John Kasich’s administration announced
an initiative yesterday to help pregnant mothers kick their heroin and prescription-drug
habits.

The $4.2 million Maternal Opiate Medical Support Project aims to improve the health of mothers
and newborns and reduce the cost of extended hospital stays for babies born with neonatal
abstinence syndrome, a disorder found in newborns exposed to drugs. The most-common conditions
associated with the disorder are withdrawal, respiratory complications, low birth weight, feeding
difficulties and seizures.

In the past decade, the number of babies born with drug addiction has increased six-fold, to 88
per 10,000 live births. That’s up from 14 in 2004.

“In the midst of Ohio’s opiate epidemic, it is easy for us to forget that there are some
individuals who are experiencing the effects of this addiction who never chose to use drugs —
babies born to opiate-addicted mothers,” said Tracy Plouck, director of the Ohio Department of
Mental Health and Addiction Services.

The initiative also should reduce health-care costs for taxpayers, because most of these births
are paid by Medicaid, Ohio’s insurance program for the poor and disabled. According to the Ohio
Hospital Association, treatment for newborns affected by neonatal abstinence syndrome cost more
than $70 million and nearly 19,000 days in hospitals in 2011. That year there were 1,649 admissions
— about five per day — to both inpatient and outpatient facilities.

Under the three-year pilot project, about 200 mothers and babies will receive drug-addiction
counseling and treatment, along with nonclinical services including housing, transportation and
baby-sitting during medical or treatment appointments.

State officials estimate the project will reduce infant stays in neonatal intensive-care units
by 30 percent.

Dr. Mark Hurst, medical director for the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services,
said addiction treatment — counseling and medication — would be integrated with physical
health-care services and continue throughout pregnancy and after the child is born. Treatment will
both minimize health problems for the mother and child, and improve the bond between them.

“If a mother relapses, she can’t parent, and the child could end up in foster care,” he
said.